If one half of our day is spent on the browser, you can be sure that the other is spent on the mobile phone. Mobile apps are the ‘new’ web. Today, we are using them to do nearly everything; from watching out for a sunny day to taking the latest stock quotes. But how do you download the mobile apps you need?

What’s missing in all of this is a search engine that can help us carry out a quick click and download job.

A search engine for mobile apps is increasingly a necessity because the whole mobile scene is splintered with different operating systems and types of devices. A search engine is just the right tool that can help us connect to mobile content, mobile downloads, and mobile apps from one search box.

So if you are in front of your browser, add the following five mobile search tools to your hunt party.

Mimvi

They know a thing or two about search because the guys behind it also ran the music search and recommendation engine SeeqPod (now inactive). The same proprietary search technology is now on Mimvi. The mobile apps search engine covers iPhone, Android, Blackberry, and web apps.

The site is still new so apps search for iPad, Windows and Nokia phones are still being worked on. Enter your keyword (e.g. “˜weather’ or “˜friends’) and you get results tagged by an icon for the right platform. Use the keyword “˜free’ or “˜freeware’ for free mobile apps. You can dive deeper by clicking on the “˜People who searched this item also searched”¦‘ link.

Mimvi also has platform specific search pages for Apple, Android, and one for Games.

AppExplorer.com is a handy alternative to iTunes search. You can search for iPhone, iPad, or iPod specific apps and filter them by category, price, or user rating. You can further sort the search results by price, popularity, rating, or newest apps first. As soon as you type in your search query, you will get a dropdown with auto-suggestions. The suggested apps also have the price mentioned.

The app specific page gives out a lot of useful info on the app. A very useful feature is the price alert which lets you watch for dropping prices or special offers. You can share your favorite apps with your friends or keep the desired ones on your wish list. The appstore search engine makes it convenient if you can’t access iTunes.

Uquery.com is a new search engine that converges on iPhone & iPod Touch applications. It is similar to the previous mobile search engine. For your search results, you can get to the right app by using the filters on the left of the page. A star rating system and recommendations (Facebook login required) help to get the better ones.

To term AppStoreHQ as just a search engine would be wrong. It offers a lot more as it taps into the leading tech and iPhone blogs and Twitter to get the entire buzz on iPhone, iPad and Android apps. It calculates the “˜hotness’ of a particular app by tracking mentions of it on the blogosphere and Twitter. It is this carefully cultivated index of mobile apps you can search through for the download.

For iTunes, all apps in the U.S. App Store, rated by Hottest are listed on top. Each app comes with lot of details on its own page like reviews and social mentions. The lists that are worth checking out are Hottest, and the Hottest on Twitter.

If you are in the U.S, you can search for iPhone and Android apps from your mobile browser using Google. The Google Search for Mobile displays special links and content at the top of the search results which point to the app’s Android Market or iPhone App Store page. The results will appear when your search relates to a mobile app and relevant, well-rated apps are found. The Google Mobile blog says that other platforms and devices will slowly be included in the search results.

Mobile app downloads are leapfrogging ahead as devices get more sophisticated. These handy mobile app search engines are just a few more tools to keep up.

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Salladin

October 4, 2010 at 1:12 pm

It's a nice list no doubt but i would be much happier with one place with international tariff plans put together so there's no need to search on your own. I've done some research and found this site - http://simtariff.com/. From O2 to T-Mobile, you can compare almost every popular tariff. It helps a lot in my opinion.

It's a nice list no doubt but i would be much happier with one place with international tariff plans put together so there's no need to search on your own. I've done some research and found this site - http://simtariff.com/. From O2 to T-Mobile, you can compare almost every popular tariff. It helps a lot in my opinion.

Search engines are all about indexing. I guess, mobile app search engines are still relatively new because I couldn't find many players in this niche. I wonder why, when this is such a booming sector and you have search engines for practically everything else.

Saikat Basu is the Deputy Editor for Internet, Windows, and Productivity. After removing the grime of an MBA and a ten year long marketing career, he is now passionate about helping others improve their storytelling skills. He looks out for the missing Oxford comma and hates bad screenshots. But Photography, Photoshop, and Productivity ideas soothe his soul.